CATHOLICISM

When you are raised a Catholic, you die a Catholic. You may not believe in God and you may not attend Sunday mass, but when you are questioned about your religious roots, you proudly proclaim, "I am a Catholic."

It's Sunday morning. I was baptized, went to confession, received First Holy Communion, served on the altar, kissed the bishop's ring at confirmation, exchanged matrimonial vows once and watched my father receive extreme unction before his death. But I won't be going to mass today. I don't remember the last time I attended mass although I find a minute to step into the Immaculate Conception Cathedral when I am downtown. Built in the 1850s, the gothic structure is the most magnificent building in South Texas.

I dip my fingers in the holy water, bless myself and genuflect when I find myself in front of the tabernacle. Jesus hangs bleeding from the cross, the Virgin Mary radiates like a beautiful nun attired in heavenly blue and the statues of various saints fill their niches. St. Jude Thaddeus is my sentimental favorite. He is the patron saint of hopeless causes. As a family, after reciting the rosary before bedtime, we would beseech his intercession with God in the hopes that our financial situation might improve.

I went to parochial school from first through eighth grades and we held the priests and sisters on pedestals. The priests were Irish with their thick brogues. They were strong men. They were the opposite of today's pedophiles as they left the church in droves to marry. The sisters were the embodiment of purity. God forgive you if the sisters complained to your parents about your comportment. There were immediate physical repercussions.

As I grew older, Catholicism made no sense. As a by product, religion made no sense to me. I saw the bible as a book of mythology and Catholicism as an interpretation of that mythology. Heaven, hell and purgatory failed to exist for me. I saw the entire promotion of eternal life as a rejection of death's reality.

I am not an atheist. The universe is incomprehensible and I am ignorant. Therefore, who am I to say if there is a God or an assembly of Gods governing the infinite realms. In regards to the eternal question, the minute logic I possess leads me to conclude that when I am dead, I am dead. Nevertheless, I owe many debts of gratitude to the church, the most important being that my Catholic upbringing has made me less susceptible to becoming a religious right reactionary. Religious fervor, in my opinion, is a negative. It turns a person into a lemming. Religious fervor gave us the devil Donald Trump. 

Like many secular Jews, we secular Catholics can't help but conclude that believing Christian doctrine is bullshit, but we don't hold individuals practicing Christians' beliefs against them. If the bible brings you succor in this volatile world, more power to you, but please don't try to convert me. Besides my logic, my animal instincts categorically reject the fantasy world that you have decided exists.

When you are indoctrinated with Christian/Catholic propaganda from the time you become conscious of your surroundings, you never escape the paranoia that the nuns pounded into your head from the time you were a first grader that the fiery pits of hell awaited you if you died with mortal sin on your soul. This fear fills you with a superstition that it may not be a bad idea to summon a priest for your final confession just in case there was some truth to these teachings and you don't want to spend eternity in hell because you didn't heed the warnings.

In the meantime, there will be no mass for me and I will continue to commit both venial and mortal sins since we have no other alternative when we're born with original sin on our souls. Had Adam and Eve obeyed God, we would be residing in Eden sleeping with our heads against the flanks of lions instead of next to someone with teeth that cut to the bone like razor blades.

To be a Catholic with all the traditions that allegedly stretched back to St. Peter and St. Paul, our Jewish fathers, evokes another time when faith ruled and its accompanying optimism in contrast to the dark pessimism that reigns today. 

Every Good Friday we would stop at each of the fourteen stations of cross and relive Christ's tortures, his crown of thorns and his crucifixion only to gather in an opposite setting with my siblings on Easter Sunday two days later and drool over the turkey-sized ham and all the fixings steaming next to it. 

My brothers and I, attired in suits, would take our seats with my sisters, the pictures of innocence and angelic in their white dresses, nestled close to the table while my mom and dad reveled in their quiet pride that the family that prayed together, stayed together. 

Catholicism gave us these immemorial moments. But like my faith, these hallowed occasions are gone forever, but not even the delusion of eternal life was meant to last forever.